


And any way you choose me we won't be long

by Macaron



Category: Chernobyl (TV 2019)
Genre: A lot of comfort because I'm soft, Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Falling In Love, M/M, Melancholy, Romance, soft radioactive men
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-20
Updated: 2019-06-20
Packaged: 2020-05-15 08:11:09
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,540
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19291750
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Macaron/pseuds/Macaron
Summary: "I don't.""What?""I don't-" I don't have someone. I don't have a lover. I had before but not now."I don't fall in love easily."Boris laughs again. "Of course you don't."





	And any way you choose me we won't be long

They are coming to their hotel rooms. It's a good night, they have had half an hour with Khomyuk where they drank and talked about things that aren't dead people, rbmk, boron and sand, and now they are walking and not freezing. It's late. It's a good night. Valery is even a little drunk, not really drunk because he not allow himself do be drunk, but definitely a little tipsy.

"You should call your wife." He says to Boris because it's what Boris does. He isn't jelaous, of the fact that Boris has a family, people to call, he could have people to call too but again Valery doesn't allow himself.

"It's late, she is already sleeping." People really sleep at night, Valery thinks. Outside this bubble, outside _this_ there are people that can just go to bed at night and sleep. It's really so simple.

"Was it love at first sight?" He asks. Because he's a little tipsy.

Boris laughs and scrolls his shoulder. "I don't even know if it was love. Ever." He waits few seconds. "We liked each other in probably, it was the right choice for our lives. It's a good wedding." And in those words there is a shade of softness.

They continue to walk.

"And you?"

Me? What? Valery wonders. He knows what Boris is asking. He just doesn't know the answer. He isn't even sure they can talk about these things. Not because it's forbidden (he can trust Boris, he trusted him since the beginning. Maybe even before), because it's too superficial, disrespectful of the place where they are putting their feet. They are not friends who have gone out to drink together, they are dead men walking.

"I don't." and he hopes it's enough.

"What?" But of course it isn't.

"I don't" have someone. I don't have a lover. I had before but not now."I don't fall in love easily."

Boris laughs again. "Of course you don't."

And if it wasn't a good night, if he wasn't a little bit tipsy, if he wasn't with Boris he would move on and not ask. But because of all those things he asks.

"Why?" Why are you telling me this?

Boris looks at him in the eyes and there is more softness than when he was talking about his wife. "You are not an easy man, Valera." says like it was, instead the easier answer in the world.

"And you are?"

"Of course I am." There are so many of course in Boris' life. He is not made of nuance, he is made of extremes . "I'm just a party man, a bureaucrat. Easy, boring."

Valery thinks. Thinks about the man that is walking near him. He thinks about Boris talking about divers and miners calling them "our boys". Boris asking him to explain to him how a nuclear reactor works and how he yells on the phone and then how everyone fills sacks and bags with sand. Boris, who continues to order sausages, he doesn't like sausages, no one would like those sausages, just to feed the dogs that have been abandoned. Boris that reminds him to fix his tie but then he is always a step behind him to make sure he is okay.

Boris is not easy, he is easier. Everything is easier with Boris, so easier that all his walls, protections, shields got up and he didn't even notice.

He is just a scientist, Boris is another thing.

"You are not boring. You are the core, Boris." Valery says, because he is tipsy and he is brave too, and he hopes that Boris understand and not understand.

Boris smile and looks younger. "You should drink more often."

"I shouldn't. I'm a sad drunk."

"You shouldn't be."

He really shouldn't.

 

 

 

It’s raining.

"You should stop to feed the dogs."

Boris ignores him. Sometime Valery thinks that this is Boris' way to release the tension. He is so focused on what Valery says during the day, when they are working that is reaction is to deliberately ignore him in these situations. Or maybe he is just annoying.

"You really should. You are not helping them."

"You remind to the miners to put their hats on. " He throws another piece of sausage to the dogs.

"One night you'll not find them anyway." When did he become Cassandra? He was a nice person. A lifetime ago. Valery never thought of himself as the life of the party, he was always a scientist first and a person second but once he was both.

"One day they'll not find me." It's true but it shouldn't be.

"I have a cat at home. Sasha. She is sweet, she doesn’t like the fish and she likes to play with my glasses.  I care about her." He will have to think of someone that will take care of her when the five years that are hanging on his head like a sword of Damocles expire.

"I never had dogs, when I was a child my father was allergic and after with work ..." he snorts "I never had time." He sighs. "I guess we can say that I won't have any more time."

Valery would like to have something to throw at the dogs.

When they arrive at the hotel, he realizes that they have started to walk closer together, almost as if they were holding hands without really holding hands.

How many nights of “things that could be and aren't” are there in five years?

 

 

 

 

In some way they mastered the art to speak speak without being heard when they are in their rooms. Just a few words every now and then, the less compromising ones. It almost makes Valery laugh  because outside the scientific and academic sphere, where he is respected, it has always been easy for him.. Don't be heard, don't get noticed.

It's late, he is tired and every minute that passes is always more difficult to concentrate. But he needs to focus, they have so little time.

Boris put a hand on his shoulder.

"Go to sleep."

"No no I need to look again at these numbers-"

"You are up since the six in the morning, go to sleep. They'll be here tomorrow." At least they hope. They are walking, okay sitting, in the most dangerous place in the world, there may not be a tomorrow and nobody would be surprised.

"Not that something would change if I went to bed, I wouldn't sleep anyway." He tries to object.

"Trouble sleeping?"

"Ha!" Valery laughs and he looks at him "Can you really fall asleep easily? Even now?"

"Sure. Like a baby." Of course he does. He probably dreams of party meetings, and important political acknowledgements while Valery is awake staring at the ceiling. Good work comrade.

"I have nightmares sometime." Valery is so lost in his thoughts that he almost doesn't hear him.

"Mh?"

"Recurrent nightmares. They call me from the nuclear plant and they says that they couldn't stop the fire, that everything is blown up. I can't exactly understand how and what, in my dreams but they say that you died in the explosion, in the fire. Something changes in the nightmare but that is always the end."

Valery doesn't know what to say. A couple of minutes before he was picturing himself fighting alone against windmills and he had almost forgotten that Boris was always part of his team. He felt lonely all his life and this had to happen to change things. What a waste.

"You can't save everyone. All Pripyat, all the world." Says. Because it's true, because Boris is having the nightmares and he needs to know that he is already doing so much. That he is one of the good guys.

"Hell this city!" Boris raises his voice and, luckily he lowers immediately "Hell this fucking nation. They can all burn. I don't want to save them, I want to save you."

And Valery doesn't know what to say to this so he kisses him. Because fuck it, fuck everyone. Fuck everything except this man in his room.

It's slow and soft. This is the first thing that Valery thinks when he realizes that he is kissing Boris and Boris is kissing him back.He always thought, in the rare moments when he really allowed himself to think about it, that kissing Boris would be an explosion, a supernova. Boom. A reaction so intense that the hotel walls collapse. He thought, he imagined a lot of passion,  intensity, drama, a shag on the desk. He has not imagined something slow, soft that seems to fill his heart so much that it is too much. But it's obvious that it had to be like this. They are running out of time and in this kiss the time almost seems to stop. They'll have passion, Valery hopes, now they have comfort, safeness.

Boris breakes the kiss "I don't really want let this city burns."

He can't hold back a laugh. "Of course you don't."

"I just want you to be safe, Valera."

He can't be safe, they'll die in five years. They know it. There is no hope. No happy ending. They know it. Valery kisses him again.

"I'm safe."

**Author's Note:**

> Obviously this story is based on the characters of the TV series Chernobyl , that are just characters in an amazing TV series. No disrespect to their real life counterparts.  
> English is not my first language so let's try to imagine that it was written with a better grammar.  
> The title is from Spaceyboy, Smashing Pumpkins.


End file.
